dezdono reviewed The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
Review of 'The Professor and the Madman' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
Overall a good look at the history of English dictionaries in general, and a profile of the lives of Dr. Minor and James Murray. I did drop this a star because of commentary towards the end as to whether Dr. Minor being properly treated for his mental illness would have prevented his working on the dictionary, and thus would have been a loss to English language as a whole. Nonsense. He liked words, and all his institutionalization did was provide him with nothing else to do, so he contributed more. I strenuously object to the idea that mental illness is something that sparks creativity (think of all the, "art is suffering" people). His work on the dictionary wasn't hampered by his delusions, therefore the only thing we can conclude is that he would probably have gotten a fair amount of research done in his free time had he received adequate …
Overall a good look at the history of English dictionaries in general, and a profile of the lives of Dr. Minor and James Murray. I did drop this a star because of commentary towards the end as to whether Dr. Minor being properly treated for his mental illness would have prevented his working on the dictionary, and thus would have been a loss to English language as a whole. Nonsense. He liked words, and all his institutionalization did was provide him with nothing else to do, so he contributed more. I strenuously object to the idea that mental illness is something that sparks creativity (think of all the, "art is suffering" people). His work on the dictionary wasn't hampered by his delusions, therefore the only thing we can conclude is that he would probably have gotten a fair amount of research done in his free time had he received adequate treatment for his illness.
